I'm posting this chapter despite my laziness in translating it during January.
Posted: 08/02/2024
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By the time Harry turned four, Hera had more than just a few gray strands in her hair.
"Miss Juno! Harry is eating tart again!"
Hera sighed as she heard Dudley shout from the kitchen, making her look away from her novel and stand up. Duda was big, with a lot of baby fat, but also tall. He was very blond and wore light summer clothes.
"Harry, darling, no more tart... STOP GIVING HIM TART, VENUS!" The goddess exploded when she saw her daughter-in-law placing a slice of treacle tart on Harry's saucer, who was looking innocently at Hera.
"He's growing" was Aphrodite's response, making Hera's nostrils dilate. Harry took a happy bite of his sweet treat. Dudley asked for some too.
Harry stood tall, being 108 centimeters tall. Her hair grew to be messy, which still made Aphrodite smile. His cheekbones were high and stood out when he smiled his typical bright smiles, his favorite kind of smile. Despite everything, his disposition was similar to his favorite clothes, sets of navy blue overalls: a brat with all his heart and mind.
"We've talked about eating more than one slice of tart after lunch, haven't we, Harry?" Hera said tiredly, looking at the little boy who sat across from her in the room.
"But isn't it always after lunch?" The little boy asked, very astutely. Hera pinched the bridge of her nose.
He had this very well-trained tongue of his. It could be said that he was from Hermes and there would be no doubt about it, with the exception of his jet-black hair. None of Hermes' children were born with black hair.
"Really, but that's not what I meant. I meant that whenever you have lunch, you can only have two slices of tart."
"Oh." Harry said, eyes widening. Worst of all, he actually looked innocent, like a deer in headlights.
The boys were already heading to preschool, Shining Stars Nursery, off Reigate Road. Harry and Dudley stayed in the same room and gathered more friends than they already had on Privet Drive. Their uniforms looked like long sweaters and they wore long socks along with shorts. Aphrodite always hugged them when she saw them like this, bringing a long smile from Harry and a flushed face from Dudley, who was already entering the period of not wanting to be grabbed. Harry went to house number 5 every day to give Juno his notes, proudly. She, as his godmother, nodded smiling with pride.
As the boys grew up, the neighborhood became closer with the intertwining of the children, who every day got together to play in the street or at someone's house. When Harry turned three years old, Petunia asked Juno if she wanted to be the boy's godmother. Hera was a little bewildered when she received the invitation.
She was a goddess, had many godchildren named in her temples, but that was eons ago. Furthermore, she was never named individually, always being honored from afar by her priestesses, who invoked her will to bless the babies.
She would never admit it, but she was moved by Petunia's request.
"Mum, can I watch TV?" Harry asked, his head tilted back so he could look at Hera. The second mother "joke" was serious with Harry.
"Of course, Harry" Hera sighed, and saw Harry call Dudley into the living room, where they each sat on a sofa and Harry took the remote. "I need vacation..."
Aphrodite let out a giggle, which irritated Hera a lot.
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"London bridge is falling down, falling down, falling down, London bridge is falling down, my fair Lady~!" Harry sang softly, waving his toy musket playfully.
"Concentrate, Harry" The Prof. Tantalus caught the boy's attention, who quickly fell into line with the other boys, who were laughing. "I hope you guys have practiced your fist grip, because we'll be practicing for now."
The boys' smiles instantly fell, but Harry's grew longer.
"Everyone come to the center and line up. I will assess how you are doing and separate them into pairs."
Harry happily jumped into the middle of the room, while the boys seemed wary of staying in class now, but they still went anyway.
Fencing classes took place once a week, always on Tuesdays or Thursdays. The Prof. Tantalus was a former Olympian who competed for Great Britain at the 1988 Olympics, who retired once he returned to England. He opened the fencing academy just a year ago, on Bermondsey Street, and catered for all ages. Juno signed Harry up for weekly lessons as soon as he turned five, while Dudley went to rugby lessons at Reed's School, with instant approval from Vernon, a sports enthusiast. Petunia was more wary about Harry using swords.
"Nonsense, dear" Juno dismissed calmly. "Every little hero must have good training. Right, Harry?"
"Yep!" Harry said smilingly, raising his musket. It was almost half his size, which was really funny to see on a five year old.
With the children lined up, Tantalus shouted:
"Salutation!" The boys raised their muskets in front of their faces.
The teacher looked at them all, standing at the side of the line. Nodding at the correct position, he shouted again:
"En garde!"
The children stamped their feet, pointing their muskets forward, stretching their arms forward.
"Louder, Chuck. Straighten your left foot, Thomas. Bend your knees, Tristan. March!"
The boys jumped forward in a movement similar to the gait of a crab.
"Fente!"
At different times and in an awkward way, the boys bent in a thrusting motion. Thomas, the boy with the wrong foot, lost his balance and fell forward.
"Ouch!"
"Standing!" Tantalus ordered, looking sternly at the boy on the ground. He wasn't the kindest about mistakes.
Harry and Chuck helped Thomas up, and he got back into position. Everyone returned to their starting positions, already knowing what would come next:
"Fente!" Tantalus ordered.
The boys bowed again, launching the movement. Thomas took an extra step forward and Tristan lost his balance, but quickly grabbed someone to prevent a fall.
"Attention!" Tantalus called them. "En garde!"
The boys returned to their places and got into position. The Olympic fencer walked in front of them, assessing them with a critical eye.
"Apparently, you still don't have much muscular logic about what you should do," Prof. Tantalus declared, looking at the class. "I'm going to separate you into pairs now and you will train your guard and lunge. And," An evil smile crept across the professor's face. "Harry will be my assistant."
The boys' terror was as great as Harry's smile, who looked like a shapeshifting devil in his white, padded safety suit. He had a wicked look that resonated with the teacher's, causing the other boys to shudder.
Harry was the best in the class, but for all the wrong reasons: he was really jerky, so he moved much faster than a normal fencer would move; He also has broader shoulders, which guarantees a much greater agility in moving his arms than other boys, limited by age. Finally, there was the fact that he was cruel enough to attack with the musket as if it were a sword, so the boys would often feel whiplash due to him waving the musket in the form of a whip.
"Fente!"
Harry, very excited, threw himself at the boys, causing them to scatter. He laughed along with Tantalus, who really liked the boy's attitude.
"You heard him. En garde!"
Chuck, the poor unsuspecting guy who didn't run fast enough away from Harry, was the first to be attacked with spikes that Harry violently and quickly descended on him.
"OUCH!" Chuck complained, receiving a blow to the hand, dropping the musket.
"Attention!" Tantalus shouted, making Chuck quickly bend down to pick up the saber. Harry, thankfully, went against the other boys.
"Fente!" He shouted happily, attacking the boys in movements that seemed to imitate the steps of an angry crab.
Anthony and Max, the smartest of the boys, looked at each other for a moment and nodded, launching double attacks at Harry.
"Conspiracy!" He shouted happily. "Jacobins!"
"Conspiracy!" He shouted happily. "Jacobins!"
Harry ducked and backed away, deflecting the harpoons with his own as they tried to hit him from two different sides. In an unpredictable movement he threw his arm forward and pushed Anthony away, but before completing the attack he reversed, returning to position and attacking Max, who had launched his own attack in the opening that was made when Harry attacked Anthony.
"Fired!" Harry said, smiling at the boy. He then ducked under Anthony's attack, quickly returning and jabbing him in the chest. He sang: "Fired!"
Unfortunately for him, the other boys also came up with a plan, so as soon as Max was hit, Harry found himself up against four other sabers, which surprised him. He then broke into a smile.
"Émeute! Come!"
But it was not possible for him to win: Tristan and Thomas served as a distraction, while Mark and Alan prepared themselves behind him, deceiving Harry's background vision with the idea that they would delay in attacking him. In the end, he was jabbed twice by moves that passed over the bodies of the distractions, hitting Harry in the stomach and chest.
"Ouch" The boy pouted, stopping his attack and taking a step back. "Jacobins." He grumbled softly, leaving the room and going to sit next to Chuck, Anthony and Max. The three of them had long smiles, making Harry give them a dirty look.
With the pseudoarthropod threat (Harry) out of the game, the four remaining boys threw themselves at each other to see who would be the winner of the class. The sabers came clumsily, deflecting each other as marches and retreats were made in pairs, Mark and Alan on one side and Tristan and Thomas on the other. In the end, without Harry to make them focus on one target despite their irritation at the others' poor performance, the sabers turned on each other unintentionally and the battle ended in less than a minute, when Tristan, in an ugly and Uncoordinated, bent more than a normal deflection position and stretched out his arm, hitting Mark in the chest.
Harry, who was playing thumb war with Chuck, quickly got into position when Tantalus approached the boys.
"You have improved a lot in responding in combat" declared the professor, looking at the boys lined up next to each other. "However, there is still a lack of control in handling the saber, in etiquette and, mainly, in teamwork. If Harry hadn't been in the game, would you have abandoned your pairs if they didn't do as well as you had hoped?"
The boys were embarrassed by the professor's criticism, who looked at them sternly.
"Class is already ending, so you can go pack your things to go home. Next Tuesday we will do individual simulated combat and next Tuesday we will do double combat. In the last week of November we will study rapid group combat techniques. Practice your balance and footwork, because we're just going to do a quick review session before the fights. Dismissed."
"Yes sir."
The children went to their lockers and picked up their backpacks and shoes, took off the warm armor and protective mask they left in the lockers, taking off their white training overalls and changing into the clothes in their backpacks. One by one, the children finished dressing and putting on their shoes and went to the entrance room, where they sat on sofas waiting for their parents to arrive.
Tantalus sat behind the reception desk, drinking from a pot of coffee that was on a counter. If he didn't seem to want to drink the whole jug himself, one of the boys might have asked for some.
"One, two, three, four, thumb fight!" Thomas and Harry shouted, holding hands and trying to grab the other's thumb.
"Hmm!" Thomas grunted, pulling his finger from under Harry's and making a spinning movement to grab Harry's finger.
"Not today" Harry smiled, attacking Thomas with a pincer movement that was difficult to hold back due to the force that the boy almost couldn't avoid.
The other kids were watching or talking among themselves, the clock ticking until it struck 5pm, the time when their parents were supposed to show up to pick them up. At 4:56pm, Mark and Tristan were taken by their parents, who had arrived together. After them were Anthony and Chuck, the first leaving by car with his parents and the second on a bicycle with his older brother. Thomas, Alan and Max practically all went at the same time, being taken by their mother, sister and uncle, respectively. Max had barely left before Juno arrived to pick up Harry, graceful in a long straw-colored dress and a blanket that covered her shoulders and bust.
"Hi Juno" Harry greeted her, approaching the tall woman.
"Hello Harry" Juno reciprocated gently, pleased that he didn't call her mum in public*. Talk about something awkward to explain to others.
"Mrs. Greyson" Tantalus rose from his seat to greet her, bowing respectfully to the woman.
"Hello Tantalus" Juno greeted him, but without any sign of the kindness she had reserved for Harry. Then she said in a falsely curious tone: "How was Harry's performance?"
The boy pouted. She always asked the professor for a word when it came to him, especially Tantalus.
"He's been doing very well, lady" The former athlete replied, oblivious to Harry's grimace. "It is the most advanced so far. I believe we will be able to enter field training next year."
Harry looked at the professor, intrigued about what field training in fencing would be like.
"Not until he's eight years old" Juno denied. "After that I think he will even be able to do missions."
"Yes lady."
Harry looked from Tantalus to Juno and back again, confused as to what they were talking about. However, when Juno reached out to him, he quickly forgot about their conversation and started talking to her about the class and her incredible combat moves, amusing her.
Harry didn't even notice how Tantalus's machine, carafe, and coffee cup had disappeared and reappeared as quickly as Juno's arrival and departure.
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"TWF" was a thing for those who grew up watching Cartoon Network in 2010.
* - I honestly don't know if it's written correctly.
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